The Cape Heritage Museum at The Cape of Good Hope Castle is proud to be a diverse and inclusive museum. It is an unedited story of South Africa. It is home to all people who made the Cape their home, the Khoi, the San, the Dutch, the British, the Malays, the Jews, the Indians, the Xhosas, the French, the Arabs and many others. It is a space to share and celebrate stories of cultural connections and provides evidence that we have more in common than we know. Your own story will become clear and/or more intense after a visit to The Cape Heritage Museum, located in the oldest building in South Africa. (click on image to find out more)

The Castle was formally opened in 1995 when it opened most of its doors to the public, and most military functions moved to other bases outside the Castle. The museum houses different chapters of our military history, dating from the European nation to set records on our shores, the Portuguese in 1488 at Mossel Bay, followed by their defeat against the Khoi during the Battle of Table Bay in 1510. (click on image to find out more)

The Camissa Museum tells the stories of the peopling of the Cape. It reveals the rich and complex history of Camissa Africans, those classified as ‘Coloured,’ who have been portrayed by others for centuries but never by themselves. This history and these stories, that have been buried and hidden for centuries, are now told for the first time. (click on image to find out more)

The Kitchen is located in between the Circumnavigation and Cape Heritage Museum and under the oldest office of the Cape, it has a well in the middle which the ground water from the streams of Camissa rivers of the Cape and shows old stoves and ovens were likely used by enslaved people such as Adam Kok I during his stay at the Castle. (click on image to find out more)

The museum was opened in 2018 when the embassy of Spain to South Africa partnered with the Castle of Good Hope, University of Cape and other stakeholders to commemorate the 500 years of the voyages of Elcano and Magdelene and it is located under the former governors’ offices in the Castle. In the museum there is documentaries describing the voyages and small replication of the inside of a ship which will appeal more to family groups. The exhibition is around what used to be the medieval kitchens under the offices and with architecture of the 17th century. (click on image to find out more)

Fine and interesting examples of paintings and decorative art of special relevance to the Cape are to be found in the William Fehr Collection. Contained in the collection is a wealth of historical information concerning the peoples and landscapes of early colonial South Africa. It is one of the most important public collections of artefacts of the period. (click on image to find out more)

One of the most important chapters of the unsung heroines and heroes of both wars is the one in partnership with one of the Rivonia trialist Dr Dennis Goldberg’s “Third World in World War II”, that is solely focused on the atrocities, femicide and inequalities faced by the third or developing nations of the world during the war. The museum reflects on the vicious treatment of the people of the third world during the war, it is not mainly on the battlefields but the communities around the conflict areas and the post-war treatment of soldiers based on racial classification. (click on image to find out more)

The granary is one of the driest rooms in the Castle. Originally, it was the governor’s granary. It was later used as a gunpowder magazine because the previous gunpowder store had become too damp. (click on image to find out more)